Okay, here's the idea: You know how women are the ones who bear children and men usually go to work and make the money while women stay home and raise the kids and bake cookies? What if there were a show about the men having to help raise the kids? There could be hilarious scenes of men pushing strollers — men pushing strollers — and taking their kids to the store and talking about how hard it is to raise kids. It would be so topical.

In 1960 — in 1960, when men didn't raise their kids, it would have been topical. In fact it was — it was called My Three Sons. Or in 1983, when men still didn't raise kids but were starting to, because women were entering the workforce exponentially, it would have been topical. It was, and it was called Mr. Mom. In 2012, it's called Guys with Kids, and it shows a profound misunderstanding not only of what entertainment is but also of the last 30 years in the evolution of the American family. Today, both parents work in 58.5 percent of U. S. households. Sure, 30 percent of the time the father works while the mother stays home, but society has shifted such that child-rearing is no longer foreign to most men. When a father is with his children, he's not "babysitting" or "playing Mr. Mom." He's being a father. He's not a buffoon, and it's not charming to see him struggling with diapers or with the fact that the babysitter just canceled and he really wants to go to the Knicks game. These are familiar situations.

Sometimes we watch television because it makes the familiar funny, and that's comforting. But sometimes it's just familiar, and that's boring.